Meeting in the Woods
Matilda was about to shoot when a creak from above made the reindeer scurry into the forest for cover. She rolled onto her back and released her arrow into the tree, smirking when the steel tip of her arrow lodged into her stalker’s chest.
“You might as well wipe that smirk off your face. This was nothing. It tickled if I’m being honest,” he purred as he slowly eased the arrow out of his chest.
“Any time I draw blood is a victory,” Matilda said as she gathered her belongings.
“I can’t argue with you there,” Gregorio agreed. “You should be more careful, Matilda.”
“Why is that?” she asked, slinging her quiver onto her back.
“You’re a young woman, and you’re all alone in the woods. No telling what vile creatures lurk about. No one would hear your desperate cries for help.”
“You know, usually, when someone has a fantasy, they keep it to themselves.”
“Is that what you think I want?” the hooded vampire asked, his voice smooth yet ominous.
He gracefully descended from the branch he was perched on and silently landed on his feet, barely making a whisper of a sound.
Matilda had to remind herself not to be so familiar with the traitorous vampire.
She couldn’t be distracted by his playful taunts and witty comebacks.
If he wanted, he could snap her neck and drain her before you could say the third line of the Lord’s Prayer.
Maybe dying won’t be so bad. There will be no struggle, no strife, no worry. Just nothingness, she thought.
“Perhaps,” Matilda answered as she returned to the ten rabbits she stored a few yards away.
“I’m appalled that you would believe that I would’ve snatched you up in a blink of an eye like an eagle grabbing a plump mouse for his dinner. It troubles me that you’d think I’d drain you while giving you the last screw of your pathetic life. It’s not nice to judge, Matilda.”
“Hmph. Not only are you a traitor to your king, but you’re a sexual deviant as well? I can’t say that I’m surprised. That is what you vampires are—nasty, lying, scheming, bloodsucking, traitorous defilers with zero morals or ethics.”
“True. That describes me on my good day,” Gregorio replied.
“Your mother should be so proud.”
“Would your mother be proud of what you’ve become? A failed huntress begging for handouts?”
Matilda humorlessly chuckled. She knew what he was up to. He wanted her to lose her cool, but she refused to take the bait.
“A dead woman doesn’t have any thoughts. Speak your business or hold your venomous tongue.”
“Have you reconsidered my offer?” Gregorio queried.
“I never considered it. I’m not doing it. Find someone else to do your dirty work. And before you ask, I’m keeping the money. Think of it as buying my silence.”
“Perhaps you’re not as smart as I thought. You’d be delivering yourself to the belly of the beast,” Gregorio mused.
“I heard it was nice and cozy inside.”
“If you refuse to carry out the assassination against King Alesi, then I will bring Night Falls to its knees, starting with everything and everyone you love.”
“I don’t have anything that I love; try harder.”
“That’s not true, and you know it. I’d start with your stallion, followed by the orc twins and the tavern. From there, I’d kill innocent human children as they play by the river.”
“You’re bluffing,” Matilda challenged. She peered into the vast darkness under the hood, hoping to catch the slightest glimpse of his face, but her efforts were in vain.
“I assure you, I’m not.”
“Show your face,” she demanded, earning a rough laugh from him.
She couldn’t see it, but she knew he was smirking beneath the hood. “Will you assassinate King Alesi?”
“No.”
Matilda blinked, and he was gone. She prayed he wouldn’t do anything reckless, but there was one thing she knew: vampires didn’t make feeble threats.
***
“Belzara? What’s wrong with your face?” Matilda whined as she swirled the ale in her cup.
“My face? There is nothing wrong with my face. It’s flawless as usual,” Belzara argued.
“You mean fucked up as usual,” Belzar said, laughing raucously at his own joke.
“My face is fucked up? Dear brother, have you looked in a mirror lately? You have to pay women to screw you. You’re so grotesque that they will only offer you their backs,” Belzara taunted.
Matilda watched with wide eyes as the orc twins bickered back and forth.
“Is that so? Last I checked, my betrothed didn’t leave me for an elf with a tight ass,” Belzar mocked.
“I left him,” Belzara protested.
Matilda sighed into her cup. Everyone knew that wasn’t the truth.
According to multiple sources, the merchant ended their relationship maliciously and publicly.
His only interest in Belzara was for her stake in the tavern.
He disappeared when she refused to sign over her rights to the tavern before they were married.
It was the most foolish plan Matilda had ever heard because there was no way Belzar would’ve allowed his sister to be duped.
The merchant would’ve magically disappeared, never to be seen or heard from again.
“You must’ve gotten a hold of some bad mead because your recollection of events has escaped you, but we’ll let it be. We should discuss how our little investment is already paying off!” Belzar exclaimed, clapping Matilda on the back, making her choke on her beverage.
“Some investment,” Belzara scoffed as Matilda attempted to regain her composure. “She returned home with only ten measly rabbits.”
Matilda gasped. “Only ten? Last I checked, you could barely get two to cross the threshold, let alone ten. Besides, it’s only been a day.”
“I want boars, Tilda. Not puny rabbits. You got it?” Belzara snapped.
“I got it,” Matilda mumbled, not wanting a fight.
A commotion caught the trio’s attention when a man ran into the tavern yelling, piquing everyone’s interest.
“Th-there has been a murder… murders!” he gasped, trying to catch his breath.
“Murders? Who? How many? Spit it out, you nitwit!” a patron shouted.
“T-two children by the river!”
Matilda’s blood thundered in her ears, and the tavern lurched sideways. For one dizzying second, she couldn’t hear or think beyond the words that had just been spoken.
Two children… murdered… by the river.
“W-were they drained?” she asked, finally finding her voice.
“No! They appeared to have been strangled!”
It was him… Gregorio. And Matilda had no choice but to meet him.
***
Matilda rode Obsidian with the vigor of a mad woman.
His hooves beat the ground in tandem with her racing heart.
She knew what had happened to those innocent children wasn’t her fault, but she had a choice and couldn’t help but think she had chosen wrong.
She had put her self-preservation over others, an act that was utterly foreign to her.
For once, Matilda chose herself, and young lives were lost as a result.
She tugged on the reins, forcing Obsidian to stop abruptly upon arriving at her earlier hunting ground.
She threw her leg over and dismounted, boots crunching in the freshly fallen snow.
Her breath furled out, clashing with the arctic wind that rolled in from the north.
“Stay,” she ordered, flipping her hood over her windblown curls.
It wasn’t long before she stood underneath the same tree “Gregorio” was earlier perched on.
“Show yourself, coward!” Matilda barked.
She closed her eyes and focused on drowning out the background noise of the whipping wind, rustling leaves, and the tiny creatures scavenging in the forest. It was faint, but she caught it.
A nearly inaudible whistling headed her direction.
Quickly, she spun to the right, narrowly escaping her challenger’s arrow.
“You’re better than I thought,” a familiar voice praised.
“Don’t you find it counterintuitive to kill the only person capable of ending King Alesi’s reign?”
“Who said you were the only being who could vanquish the great King Alesi? Hm? You’re the most disposable being.”
“Why did you kill those children?”
“You required motivation, and I have little time to spare,” he answered with a careless shrug.
Matilda drew her sword.
Moonlight flashed along the blade, bright and cold, catching his eye like the fiercest star in the heavens. It was a fine weapon—slender, light, and perfectly balanced, and he found himself wondering how many of his kind had fallen beneath it.
“Perhaps you have time to die… hybrid.”
Silence sliced through the forest like a cleaver through muscle and bone.
“How, pray tell, did you come to this wild conclusion?”
Matilda pointed at the full moon.
“I can smell it on you, dog.”
“I am not a dog,” he snarled.
“Excuse me… vampdog. I will take a wild guess. Please, correct me if I’m wrong.”
“Careful, huntress,” he warned, sliding his pink tongue over his elongated fangs.
“You pass as a vampire, but if I had to guess, your father is a full-blooded vampire, and your mother is half vampire and half wolf. You descended from the land of Moonshire and infiltrated King Alesi’s ranks.
You must truly hate King Alesi if you side with the quarter wolf in you. You can’t even shift, can you?”
Matilda smirked when he pulled out two daggers.
“Struck a nerve, did I?”
His jaw tightened, but he offered no response. He adjusted his grip on the twin blades and lowered into a fighting stance.
Matilda’s smirk grew.
Her hand drifted toward the weapon at her side as they began circling one another. At first, neither seemed eager to make the first move. Matilda watched his shoulders instead of his blades, waiting for the slightest tell.
His right shoulder twitched, and she drew her weapon just as he lunged.
Their weapons collided with a violent ring.
The force drove Matilda backward through the snow, but she recovered quickly, twisting away from the second dagger as it sliced through the air where her throat had been.
She retaliated before he could reset his footing, forcing him to block a strike aimed squarely at his ribs.